At the same time that Zhu Zhu's army attacked Yangzhou, Guo Song led 3,000 troops to enter Guanzhong from Pujin Pass, and in the early morning, he ordered 3,000 troops to be stationed on the north bank of the Wei River, and he led dozens of cavalry to Tianbao Canal to inspect.

Tianbao Canal is actually very short, from Luowei Town to Fenglingdu of the Yellow River, it is the last section of the Wei River flowing into the Yellow River, only more than 30 miles long, but it has always been an intestinal obstruction of water transportation in Guanzhong.

First of all, the terrain is high in the east and low in the west, the water flow is slow, the boats come from the east, sailing against the current, it is extremely difficult, there must be a large number of slender men to pull, but here is a steep canyon, the slender men have no way to go, so it is necessary to dig a fiber road in the mountains and rocks on both sides.

Another problem is that the river here is narrow, and the terrain is high in the east and low in the west, and the large amount of sediment carried by the Wei River and the Luo River often silts up in this section of the river, causing not only flooding, but also seriously affecting navigation.

The last time the river was dredged was in the first year of Tianbao, so it was called Tianbao Canal, decades passed, the river was silted up again, seriously affecting shipping, the ships sent from Chang'an could barely go out, but to transport it into Chang'an from the east, it was basically impossible, before Zhu Zhu transported the grain to Luoyang, they sailed from west to east, and were not greatly affected, but a large number of materials from Guo Song had to be transported into Guanzhong, and this section of the river was seriously hindered.

At present, the governor of the same state, Shi Yang Tianhua, is responsible for dredging this section of the river, which has been implemented for several months from last year to this year, and Guo Song wants to see the progress.

In the afternoon, Guo Song arrived at Luowei Town, Luowei Town is named because Luoshui flows into the Wei River, here is not only Luoshui into the Wei River, but also the place where the Cao River flows into the Wei River, the Wei River flows into the Wei River here, the amount of water in the Wei River here suddenly becomes larger, in the first year of Tianbao, a very large artificial lake is dug here, called the dry pond, covering an area of 10,000 acres, a large number of Cao transport ships are moored here.

Hearing that His Royal Highness the King of Jin arrived, Yang Tianhua hurriedly rushed over, Yang Tianhua was the previous Purun County Chief, advocating that the imperial court vigorously develop roads and water transportation, strengthen the circulation of materials, encourage commerce and trade, and criticize the checkpoint tax offices in various places.

Yang Tianhua lived up to Guo Song's expectations, and the first thing he did when he took office was to cancel the tax offices and checkpoints in Pujin Pass and Tongguan, which were the two major checkpoints that had plagued businessmen for decades, and the businessmen appealed for decades, but no one paid attention to them, and now they were finally canceled, which made the businessmen rejoice.

The second thing Yang Tianhua did was to recruit people to dredge the Tianbao Canal, this decision was fully supported by Guo Song, and Pan Liao was specially ordered to allocate 200,000 yuan for this major project, which not only involved transportation and commercial development, but also related to the logistics support of the future army to the east.

"Is that the dry pond over there?" Guo Song asked, pointing to a white, bright and frozen lake in the distance.

"Your Highness is right, that is Qianchi, and the river in the distance is the Cao River, which has been connected to Chang'an City."

Although the Wei River is the mother river of Guanzhong, the Cao River is the economic lifeline of Chang'an, and all the materials transported to Chang'an are transported by this Cao River.

"Does Caoyun need to be dredged?" Guo Song asked.

Yang Tianhua shook his head, "No need!" ”

He suddenly felt that his tone was too blunt, and it was His Royal Highness the King of Jin who asked him! He hurriedly continued to explain, "Back to Your Highness, the water quality of the Cao River is relatively clear, and I don't want the Wei River and Luoshui to carry too much sediment, so as long as it is not a rainstorm and the embankment bursts, there is basically no need to repair it, of course, it is necessary to strengthen the embankment every few decades." ”

"Go see Tianbao Canal!"

Guo Song turned the horse's head and went east, Yang Tianhua hurriedly followed, although the Tianbao Canal is short, it is also divided into two sections according to the terrain, one is the river channel of the plain terrain, about 20 miles, this section of the river has been dredged in the east, the river channel has been widened by half, and it has also been dug five feet deeper.

But the really difficult part is the second section, which passes through a ten-mile-long canyon with steep rocky mountains on both sides, and the fiber path is carved out of the rock.

The Guanzhong Plain is low, to this section of the mountainous area, the terrain gradually becomes higher, the sediment is easy to accumulate, because the sediment is piled up too much, the water is relatively shallow, and the cargo ship with deep draft will not be able to pass upstream.

At present, due to freezing, the river is cut off, so the people have installed two plank roads on the riverbed and transported the soil along the plank roads.

"We took advantage of the opportunity of freezing in winter to ask the soldiers to blow up the ice with iron fire thunder, clean up the ice first, and then dig down, but in winter it is all ice mud, frozen hard, it is difficult to dig, or use iron fire thunder to blow up, let the ice mud loosen, and then concentrate manpower to dig a section."

As soon as Yang Tianhua's voice fell, he only heard the distant 'boom!' There was a loud noise, like thunder rolling in the sky, only to hear a shout in the distance, Guo Song turned over and dismounted, and walked along the plank road.

Not long after, there were countless people in front of him, pushing the deer cart full of ice and mud to rush forward, Guo Song hurriedly retreated to the fiber road, get out of the way, and after thousands of people finished, he continued to move forward, walked for several miles, only to see that the front was full of dense people, there were tens of thousands of people, they waved pickaxes and shovels, put the ice mud into the basket first, and then put three baskets on the deer cart, and a man pushed the wheelbarrow cart away.

There were also thousands of donkeys, carrying two large bags of dirt on their backs, about three baskets.

They dug the ice mud about a foot deep so that the fleet could enter Guanzhong.

"How long will it take to finish dredging?" Guo Song asked.

"Try to finish it before the river thaws, and I am seventy percent sure!"

This statement made Guo Song very satisfied, if it was navigable before the thaw, then his wife and daughter would not have to transfer a land in Pujin Pass, and would go directly to the Tianbao Canal and the whole waterway.

Guo Song asked again: "What difficulties do you need help with?" ”

"It's a little bit difficult!"

Yang Tianhua squeaked and whined after a while: "The iron fire thunder used now is a small iron fire thunder, I heard that there are bigger ones, but the army said that it needs the approval of His Highness to use, that thing is easy to use!" ”

Guo Song laughed, at present, the small iron fire mine is approved for military and civilian use, and the large iron fire mine is too powerful and can only be used for military purposes, if it is to be civilian, it must be specially approved by Guo Song.

Guo Song nodded, "The large iron fire thunder is too powerful, it can blow up the city wall, and it is easy to hurt people, if you want to use it, I can give special approval, but you must be cautious." ”

"Thank you, Your Highness, for your approval!"

Yang Tianhua was overjoyed in his heart, with a large iron fire thunder, their speed could be accelerated.

.........

After inspecting the canal, Guo Song led the cavalry to continue their march towards Chang'an, and three days later, they finally arrived in Chang'an.

Although he had only been away from Chang'an for a few months, Guo Song could still feel some subtle changes, and the caravan had increased slightly, at least he saw two caravans with thousands of camels.

"This is thanks to Shi Donglai, who vigorously promoted in the Western Regions, telling the merchants that it was his junior brother who controlled Chang'an, and large caravans came one after another, and there will be more in the future."

At the reception banquet in the evening, Zhang Lei told Guo Song the answer, he poured a glass of wine for Guo Song, with a hint of smirk on his fat face, "I heard that the military wants to order a batch of marching sleeping bags, see if you can ....... it"

Guo Song's eyes widened, "You kid is too greedy!" I only gave you the business of 100,000 sets of winter military uniforms last year, how much did you earn, do the math yourself? ”

"I'm making a!"

Zhang Lei was so anxious that he slapped his thigh and began to complain, "I really didn't make money in military uniforms, the military pressed the price too hard, and the delivery was urgent, I had to process the money, and finally my wife calculated that a set of military uniforms only earned fifty yuan, and it took three months of exhaustion to earn five thousand yuan, if it weren't for your sake, we really didn't want to take this business." ”

Next to him, Li An also smiled and said: "Your Highness, I can testify to this matter, I and Zhang Fatzi carefully calculated an account, and in the end he can make money, or I will give him a little cheaper in the price of fabric, otherwise he will definitely lose money in this business." ”

Guo Song nodded, "This time, you still don't take over the business of marching sleeping bags, it is for the Dugu family, they also opened a quilt factory in Taiyuan, and I will find you another big business to make money." ”

"What business!"

Zhang Lei hurriedly stepped forward, blinking his little eyes, and hurriedly Li An was also tempted and leaned forward slightly.

Guo Song said with a smile: "I want to solve the accommodation problem for the low-level officials, I plan to build a batch of yards, about more than a thousand, I see that there are many dilapidated houses in Chang'an City that no one lives in, you buy these uninhabited houses, and after demolition, build them into small single courtyards, the area!" Half an acre of land is enough, and I will give you 30% of the net profit, how about it? ”